Troll Bridge Read Online Free

better,” Moira told him. “Besides, we need to find my friends. I can’t believe I slept all night.” The light at the cave’s entrance was, if anything, brighter. She stood up slowly, being careful not to hit her head.
    â€œThere is no rush,” the fox said calmly.
    â€œNo rush? That monster, that…”
    â€œThe princesses are to be troll brides, not troll dinner.”
    â€œThat’s a lot of brides,” she mused. Then she thought a minute. “I suppose that’s…” she looked for a word, “… preferable to being dinner.”
    â€œVery preferable.”
    Moira wasn’t so sure of that. Then she had another thought. “But the photographer … the man. He can’t be a bride.”
    The fox looked away and for a long moment said nothing.
    Moira squatted down and willed the fox to look back at her. Unbelievably, he did.
    â€œWhat…” she said slowly, spacing out her words for emphasis, as if talking to a slightly stupid child, or a foreigner. “… Happened … to … the … man … the photographer?”
    The fox’s black eyes bore into hers. “You do not want to know, human child.”
    â€œI do.”
    â€œYou do not.” The fox turned his head away.
    Ignoring the fox’s warning about being touched, Moira reached out and—as she did with her dog Wolfgang—took his snout in her hand, pulling his head back toward her. “Tell me.” No animal, even a talking animal, was going to get the better of her.
    He growled and ripped his face away from her grasp. Moira flinched, thinking he would bite her. But he didn’t.
    â€œHe was eaten,” the fox said. Moira paled. “And trolls are notoriously messy eaters.”
    â€œErp,” Moira said. Or something like it. A bad taste flooded into her mouth. “I think I’m going to be—”
    â€œThrow up in my cave,” the fox said tonelessly, “and I will deliver you to the troll myself.”
    She gulped back what had already risen into her mouth, and then began to sob.
    â€œTrolls,” the fox went on relentlessly, “crave meat. Fresh meat. And human meat most of all. But Aenmarr hasn’t had an opportunity to savor any since he made a pact with the humans a long time ago.” He bared his teeth. “But you humans broke the pact. Aenmarr must have eaten this meal with gusto.”
    Sputtering through her tears, Moira cried, “Stop it. I don’t want to hear any more.”
    The fox relented. “I am sorry, child of man. But you did insist on hearing.”
    â€œI know. I … needed to know.” Moira tried to collect her thoughts, but all she could think about was the poor photographer—who she hadn’t even known, hadn’t even spoken to—stewed or roasted or baked or … It was too awful. “I’m a harpist,” she managed to say. “Not a hero. And I don’t … I don’t … know what … I don’t know what to do.”
    The fox smiled and showed too many teeth. “But perhaps,” he said, suddenly stretching his head up and licking the tears from her cheeks, an action that was both intimate and frightening, “perhaps I do.”
    Moira sat down heavily at the fox’s feet. “Tell me.”
    â€œThe first thing you must know,” the fox told her, “is that I am a musician, too.”
    Looking at the creature’s paws, she found that hard to believe. They were not built to hold an instrument, much less pluck strings or finger notes.
    â€œAh, but this is not my true body,” the fox said, for he’d read her mind of course. “In that body I look more like a human than an animal, though I am neither. I am a master musician. And I am called Fossegrim.”
    â€œThen why be a fox if it is not your true body, Foss?” Moira asked, leaning forward but